A Prairie Garden Journal    by Dick Meyer

Essential Plants
for a WyoBraska Landscape

The 2007 landscape season has turned out to be the longest in recent memory, and a warmer than normal fall will likely extend it into early December. With the end of the 2007 landscape season now in sight, this will be the last of this year’s columns.  Before you know it the Christmas tree will be shedding needles on the carpet and it will be time to begin planning those 2008 landscape projects, so I thought it might be helpful to end up the 2007 series with a little information that might come in handy for those January landscape design sessions.

I am often asked if I have favorite plants, and I can answer without reservation that I don’t.  That said, I do have a list of plants, or more precisely a list of types of plants that I think are essential to a successful Wyobraska landscape.  These are plants that meet two criteria—1.  they grow well without any extraordinary care, and 2. they meet a fairly high standard in terms of their visual contribution to the landscape.   Some of these plants may contribute their visual interest to the landscape in the spring and summer, others in the fall and winter, but all of them make a major contribution to the annual cycle of a Wybraska landscape.

Finally, please note that I am suggesting essential types of plants rather than essential specific plants.  There is a big difference. 

Essential Types of Plants for a Wyobraska Landscape

Previous Articles

Fractions March 15
Yardner March 8
Urban Legends of Trees March 22
Que Serra, Serra March 29
Grocery Store or Garbage Dumpster Plants April 5
Planning Your Landscape Project April 12
Planting Cool Trees April 19
Keeping Trees Alive April 26
Thrillers, Chillers, Spillers May 03
Will You Still Love Them May 10
Ornamental Grasses May 17
In Memory of Cedar Trees May 24
Gardening is not Childs Play
Versatile Viburnums June 6
Yardner Plants June 13
2007 Garden Walk and
Blue Spruce Decline
The Birds & Bees of Butterfly Gardening June 28
Summer Landscaping July 5
Cutting Your Lawn Down to Size July 12
Some Like it Hot!! July 19
When a Tree Falls on 5th Ave
July 26
Green Landscaping August 2
American Idol-Landscape Aug 9
Fall is for Planting Aug 16
Is your Landscape Neat or Messy? Aug 23
The Seeds of a good Landscape Aug 29
Big Red Fall Color Sep 6
Fall Landscaping Tips Sept 13
Fall Lawn Care Sept 20
The Colors of Autumn Sept 27
Fall is for Xeriscaping Oct 04
The New Wyobraska Fall Oct 11

2006 Articles

2007 Articles

Evergreen Trees and Shrubs

Pine and junipers are the indigenous trees of the region, and not surprisingly, many pines and most junipers are well adapted to the region’s soils and climate.  The evergreen quality of pines and junipers also make them important plants for the relatively long landscape winters of Wyobraska.  From October to April, these plants are the visual backbone of the landscape.  I suggest that about a third of the visual mass of a mature landscape should be composed of evergreen trees and shrubs.

Ornamental Grasses

Summer Flowering Perennials and Shrubs

For regions of the country that are predominantly forested, spring is the season for flowers and flowering shrubs.  But late spring, summer and fall are when flowers bloom in the prairies of the American west, and the last time I checked Wyobraska is right in the middle of the American west.  So it’s no surprise that

Summer flowering perennial flowers and shrubs perform so well in Wyobraska landscapes and thus are on my essential plant list.  Summer flowers are the specialty of Wyobraska landscapes so I suggest that, as with evergreens, a third of the visual mass of your landscape be devoted to this plant type. 

Pay special attention to the adjectives “summer flowering”.  Many well-known flowering shrubs and perennials are spring flowering—derived from and grown for those forested regions of the country where shrubs and flowers must bloom in the spring before the ubiquitous large trees get their leaves and cast their dense shade over the entire landscape for the summer.  Most spring flowering shrubs and spring flowering perennials are disappointments when used in Wyobraska landscapes—use them with caution.  And when buying flowering shrubs and perennials look for late spring to fall bloom times.

Tall Deciduous Shrubs

This is a group of plants that are underused in almost all landscapes everywhere in the country.  By tall I mean shrubs that have a mature height ranging from 8 to 15 feet.  They are essential in the Wyobraska landscape for three reasons:

1.  They are useful structural plants, being the right size to make excellent screens and dividers thereby helping to create the rooms of your landscape, 2.  Most large shrubs have a spring bloom and colorful fall foliage—providing visual interest in the landscape at two otherwise “slow” times in the Wyobraska landscape, and 3.  Most of the tall shrubs are surprisingly adaptable to the soils and climate of Wyobraska

Shady Characters

Almost every landscape needs a spot in which to escape the hot summer sun.  There are a group of native and well-adapted shade trees that not only provide dense shade in the summer, but strong visual interest in the winter.  I like to call these trees “shady characters” because their winter silhouette has a unique rugged character that adds another dimension to the winter Wyobraska landscape.

These are, in my opinion, the five essential plants types for Wyobraska landscapes. Blend these types of plants together in your landscape and it is almost impossible to not end up with a colorful landscape with year around visual interest and that distinctive Wyobraska look.  And within each plant type there more than enough choices of specific plants to satisfy the preferences of any homeowner, to complement the architectural style of any home or building, and to fit into any Wyobraska setting from established city neighborhood to country acreage.   Finding your favorite plants in each essential type is a nice assignment for those long January evenings--after the Christmas tree needles have been vacuumed up.

Thanks for reading and for your kind comments through this past season. 

 See you next spring